This one was tough. I thought I had all these great ideas but nothing was working right. It all seemed forced or contrived. Then, I found myself in the dark, thinking about everything all at once, and the succubus known as anxiety came to sit on my chest. She peeled herself off the walls and became everything. All I had to alleviate the burning hot coal in my chest was my pen and my journal.

shadow.

thick brown curtains,

elegant and unassuming,

block out the sun

cocooned in black

the air itself is a shadow

looming over me

heavy

blackened fingers of night press

firmly into my chest, pry

open my rib cage

with each breath, a

crack

indentations and

claw marks on the muscle

each score

a concern, a

blight

a fear that

trickles down

infects

lungs stomach liver

bile

sloshing as the depths

consume me and i am

no longer woman

no longer

human no

longer anything but

fuel for the

monster.

This is when things eased up a touch, and I was able to breathe. An exorcism? Hardly. More like a desperate prayer. I keep moving, keep trying, keep working.